Best Adapted Podcast

It's a Christmas Miracle! BAP returns to your feed to begin our Jane Austen miniseries. 

Rachel Stone (BOMB Magazine, Real Life Mag, The New Republic) comes back on the Pod to discuss Ang Lee's 1995 Sense and Sensibility, adapted from the Jane Austen novel of the same name. Written by, and starring, Emma Thompson, the film is a rouges gallery of UK movie stars, including Hugh Grant, Kate Winslet, and Alan Rickman. It is also the English-language debut of Ang Lee, a Taiwanese director then known for his domestic dramas about emotional repression and family relations. Does the film successfully translate Sense and Sensibility? Or does this adaptation lose the head and the heart of its source material? 

Frank, Caleb, and Rachel discuss wedding playlists, fuckbois, and Hulk. Plus, Frank brings back an old gameshow. 

This episode sponsored by The Rupert Friend Fan Club:

Find Rachel on twitter @stone_of_arc

Read Rachel's new poetry from Expat Press 

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Halloween Bonus! BAP interrupts its regularly scheduled programming to bring you a horror adaptation episode.

Written in 1974, Carrie launched the literary horror career of Stephen King. The novel weaves together religious extremism, high school dances, and teenage girls into gruesome supernatural scare-fest. Brian De Palma, a movie brat with an eye for sleaze, adapted Carrie in 1976 with Sissy Spacek and John Travolta. But are Stephen King and Brian De Palma a good pair at the Bates High School Formal? Do they slow-dance into a Radaptation? Or is it just pig-blood and disappointment? 

Follow Mads on twitter @maddoritos

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Best Adapted Podcast connects with its inner child and checks out Fantastic Mr. Fox, the Roald Dahl book and its stop-motion animation adaptation from Wes Anderson. The 2009 film assembles a star-studded voice cast of Anderson standbys (Bill Murray, Jason Schwartzman, Owen Wilson) and new collaborators for the twee filmmaker (Meryl Streep and George Clooney). The movie also expands on the initial work to become a story of mid-life crisis and familial bonding. But do the changes enhance or diminish the adaptation? Joined by Jakob Anderson (Pitch Hunt podcast), Caleb and Frank discuss spaghetti westerns, Wes Anderson’s unique place in the film industry, and celebrated actor/musician/singer-songwriter Kris Kristofferson.

Check out Jakob’s Podcast Pitch Hunt

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Best Adapted Podcast heads down South. Korea, that is, by way of Mississippi. In Burning, Korean auteur Lee Chang Dong channels the despair and apocalyptic rage of William Faulkner and Haruki Murakami to explore masculine insecurity and economic inequality in contemporary Seoul. But how well does this film translate and build on these celebrated writers’ works?

Joined by musician Mitch Peterson (slowya.roll) Caleb and Frank wax poetic on arson, Miles Davis, and the incredible performance of Steven Yuen.

Follow Mitch on twitter @slowya.roll and instagram @slowya.roll

Check out his new single “Hidden Agendas”

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BAP concludes the Los Angeles Noir miniseries with Inherent Vice, the deeply funny and deeply paranoid 2014 film from Paul Thomas Anderson. Based on the Thomas Pynchon novel, Inherent Vice is equal parts a stoner comedy and detective story with a byzantine plot of conspiracy theories and counter-cultural goofballs. Does this marijuana mystery translate to the medium of film? Or do PTA’s efforts go up in smoke?

Joined by Matthew Thomas (Red Hook Star-Revue, Duke University), BAP discusses surfing, biker-gangs, and tries to diagnose where it all went wrong for the hippie movement.

Find Matt on twitter @mattteriality

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In In 1995, American audiences mostly ignored Carl Franklin's Devil in a Blue Dress. Based on the Walter Mosley novel of the same name, the film is a rare Noir written, directed, and starring Black filmmakers, but its box office failure dashed their hopes for a full franchise. Franklin's film has developed a cult following in the last 25 years, but how does it compare to the titans of genre?

Joined by labor activist and film nut Paul Kirk-Davidoff, Frank and Caleb discuss the irresistible charms of Denzel Washington, getting liquor delivered in New York, and how much they all miss bars.

Find Paul Kirk-Davidoff on twitter @oddfellows151

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CW: this episode discusses racism and violence

Oral arguments are capped at 1 hour.

Fascist and Pinko are acceptable slurs.

All pronunciations of “noir” must be done in a French accent.

Best Adapted Podcast steps into the ring for a no-holds-barred debate over the 1997 film L.A. Confidential. With Henry ‘Hank’ Hietala presiding as judge, Frank and Caleb each make their case for, or against, Curtis Hanson’s adaptation of the James Ellroy novel. Only one host will be emerge victorious.

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For the second entry in the LA Noir series, Best Adapted Podcast looks at The Long Goodbye from 1972. Made nearly 20 years after Chandler’s novel came out, the film transposed the Phillip Marlowe story to counter-culture Los Angeles. Directed by Robert Altman, the movie was a distinctly New Hollywood approach to the noir genre that emphasized mood and tone over mystery. But how does this combination of classic and new fare as an adaptation? Joined by Zant Peralta (Under the Influence with Mads and Mitch) Caleb and Frank discuss the physique of Arnold Schwarzenegger, the swagger of Elliot Gould, and which version of 3:10 to Yuma is worth watching.

Plus, Frank debuts a new gameshow.

Find Zant on Twitter @zantperalra

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Not since God x The Chosen People has there been a more iconic/problematic collab. The certified Big Brain Boys™ from Best Adapted Podcast enter the Audio Ark this week to talk Exodus cinema, including 'The Ten Commandments' (1956, good) and 'Exodus: Gods and Kings' (2014, bad).

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